Trust get keys to the door of Seaton Delaval Hall

Dec 18 2009 by Tony Henderson, The Journal

NINE hundred years of family history ended yesterday as a house changed hands.

But this was no ordinary home.

Lord Hastings presented the key to the 18th Century Seaton Delaval Hall in Northumberland to Fiona Reynolds, director general of the National Trust.

The Seaton Delaval estate, which has been in the Delaval/Hastings family for 900 years, will now be run by the trust after an 18-month fund-raising campaign, backed by The Journal.

Yesterday, as guests gathered in the freezing shell of the building’s central hall while snow swept in from the nearby coastline, Lord Hastings joked: “You are now having an authentic 18th-Century experience – that of cold.”

The opportunity for the trust to acquire the hall, gardens and 400 acres of surrounding land came after the deaths in 2007 of Lord and Lady Hastings, who lived in the west wing .

Their son, the present Lord Hastings, farms in Norfolk and was anxious that the hall should be preserved – a goal to which his parents were committed.

The campaign by the trust raised £4m and the process was completed by the acceptance under a Government scheme of the hall for the nation in settlement of Lord Hastings’ inheritance tax liability.

So yesterday was a day of mixed emotions for Lord Hastings and his family when they arrived at the ancestral home.

“On a personal note, this is not an emotionally straightforward day,” said Lord Hastings. It was 900 years ago that my ancestor arrived here in the northern reaches of William the Conqueror’s kingdom, so by any standard it has been a long tour of duty.

“When my father arrived here just after the Second World War the hall was falling apart and could easily have become a ruin. But my parents showed a huge commitment and passion to restore and maintain the hall and its collections.”